Time
by SkippingSteppingStones
Summary: Vader has his son brought to him from prison to help pass the time as he recovers from newly-attained injuries, and comes to a decision about Luke's future, and the fate of all Skywalkers. ONESHOT


Headcanons: Autistic Force sensitives, trans Luke

Trigger Warnings: self-harm, slavery, attempted suicide

AUs: none

And an announcement: From now on, I will not be up to date on Disney canon. I will never again mention anything that they created after like…. Early December 2017. I'm not buying their merch anymore, I'm not buying their films, hell, I'm not even gonna google the plots. I thought I would but. No. I'll still write Rose in from time to time.

Vader carefully manoeuvered himself onto his elbows, struggling into a sitting position. It was a relief to have an opportunity to rest, after the battle he'd just been through, but he was already antsy, desperate to be back on the move.

It came of being a tool, he supposed. An instrument of war was not meant to lie still and recover, and he usually didn't. But the fact was that even he couldn't walk off a spinal injury, and it wasn't as easy as replacing his mechanical parts, as it would have been with an arm or leg.

So he waited.

He had dared to treat himself to a visit from his son.

The boy had been imprisoned for nearly a month now, but they'd assured him he was still in good condition, and it wasn't unreasonable for the Sith to demand an opportunity to interrogate a prisoner. And it wasn't their concern what he did in the privacy of what passed for his home.

The medical droids had withdrawn, saying he needed rest, not further treatment, and Luke would be arriving from prison soon.

It would be the first time Vader had seen him since Bespin.

He groaned, adjusting his bed to raise himself to a more comfortable sitting position. He didn't know how his son would respond to this particular view of his father. Luke knew nearly nothing about him, save what propaganda the Empire put out, and while it had been a long, painful time since Vader had last looked into how he was portrayed…

It was certainly not like this.

In preparation, though, he was giving his son almost unshielded access to the first part of his mind. The boy would recognize him, he knew, had also been told where he was going. His guards would likely have tried to frighten him with threats of torture and brutality, but Vader believed his son would be comforted quickly enough. After all, he'd prepared blankets, first aid care, and food.

It would be a comfort to a hungry child, he knew. How many times had his masters gained an ounce of his trust with something to eat? Every time he had visited Palpatine as a child, he had had food to offer, and when he had come to the Temple, one of his favourite aspects of it had been the regular meal times. So Luke, who had likely eaten little since his capture, would be glad to see his father, if only because he'd offered food.

There was a blip on Vader's console, and he looked over to see that the prison transport had arrived. He contained a flicker of excitement, wishing to reach out to Luke, but afraid of frightening him.

Instead, he tried to focus himself in the room where he sat, and in a final burst of desperation to appear composed for his son, swept the Force around the room, tidying everything not nailed down to somewhere out of sight.

He had just hidden the screen that he'd seen the shuttle on when the door opened.

They had wisely chosen to send a droid. Or perhaps he'd ordered them to, at the sight of his boy, he suddenly couldn't remember anymore.

Luke looked like death incarnate. His eyes were hollow, his hair matted and dirty, his prison jumpsuit already stained, faded, and filthy. He looked, and now Vader dared to reach out with the Force, _felt_ sick.

The droid left the boy at the door, heading back to its ship to await Vader's call to remove its prisoner. And Luke just stood there. His head was bent, his shoulders slumped. It was as if he hadn't realized that he was no longer bound.

"Luke," Vader called, as best he could. His voice was raw, almost too quiet to hear. It hadn't been necessary that he be audible to anything more than a droid in decades, but now he was afraid his son wouldn't hear it.

Luke barely looked up, peeking at Vader through his matted hair.

He looked so _broken_.

"Come," Vader said, gesturing to him. He was losing his voice, he wouldn't be able to make himself heard much longer unless the boy came closer.

Luke stumbled.

Vader felt a flare of pain from him, and reached out, drawing the pain to himself instead. He had suffered for twenty years, he could take a little more pain.

And he could. The pain didn't stagger him for the physical sensation of it, but instead for the knowledge that his son had suffered it too.

Luke, stumbled again, and fell into a tilted, off-balance run. Vader wished he could interpret it as eagerness, and not the boy trying to compensate for the unsteadiness of his stride.

He clamoured to a stop at Vader's bedside, gripping desperately to the handrail, and looking pained.

Instinctively, Vader reached out, daring to cup his son's chin in his palm, glad that at least his limbs were attached to comfort the boy.

"Luke," he whispered, and the boy shook with emotion, his eyes falling closed.

He didn't speak, only shakily lowering himself to sit on the bed, barely daring to touch the mattress, and seeming in danger of sliding off.

"My son," Vader murmured, and drew one of the additional blankets around him, drawing him closer onto the bed with it, before tucking it protectively around itself at his chest, binding him safely in its warmth.

When Luke didn't respond, he reached out again, just to touch his son's shoulder, and reassure him that he was there, before his desperation to somehow be a good father to the boy took hold, and he drew him close instead, cradling his head against his chest.

"You're safe here, little one."

The boy took an unsteady breath, and finally responded to his father's words, curling his arms into Vader's chest, and quaking.

Vader knew he was not comfortable to snuggle against, and he wished that there was more he could do to change that than he already had, covering his control panel with his blanket. Luke seemed wholly different from the boy he'd fought at Bespin, then a being of defiance and anger, now a trembling child.

"Shh," Vader whispered, carefully stroking his hair, trying not to get his spindly fingers trapped in the knots, hardened by dried blood. His gaze softened, his heart breaking as the boy's left hand clenched and shook, and his right stump pressed against his chest.

The rebels had at least done a good job of treating it. It looked as if though it had been well cauterized, and a prosthetic properly attached, only to be removed.

"Shh..."

He wanted to be a father to the boy. Even at Bespin, even after he'd injured the boy, he'd wanted to bring him _home_ , to keep him safe from harm. But when Luke had come back into his reach, he'd been across the galaxy, unable to collect his son, and he had _forgotten_ the kriffing brutality of his men! He had told them he wanted Luke undamaged, but this must have all been deemed recoverable, and permissible.

He'd known this meeting would not be idyllic. He'd known there was no happy reunion for them, but he'd hoped to ply Luke's hesitant trust with food and attention, and speak to him for a time. He'd told himself he'd given up on the dream of earning the title of 'father', and that he was only interested in hearing his son speak from a… a… Well, not an academic perspective, exactly.

He'd wanted it to file away in his dreams, the ones where Padmé still lived, and they raised their child together on Naboo. He'd planned to hear Luke's voice, know how he had been raised, and how he behaved, and add it to an imagined world where he _was_ capable of being a good father.

But Luke had taken no plying. It had been easier than he could've imagined to pull the boy into his arms, and hide him. It wasn't parenting, only a too-late attempt at protection. There was no sense of victory.

Only the knowledge that he was holding Padmé's son, broken and terrified, so helpless that he'd come willingly into his enemy's arms.

"You're safe," he promised, drawing another blanket around his son, covering his head and enclosing him in safe, warm darkness.

Luke only trembled, drawing a deep, shaking breath, and Vader's heart felt as if it was about to crumple in on itself.

For years, he had been trampled, made to follow his master's orders to retain any trace of the dream he'd held of a happy life with Padmé. For years, he had committed cruelty against the galaxy as if it could somehow make up for the loss of his mother, his wife, and his unborn child.

And in it all, he had destroyed the child's life after all.

In trying to hold onto a dead child, he had darkened the life of its actual living self, and countless other children.

He reached out in the Force, trying to draw some of the tension away from his son. He wasn't afraid of startling the boy anymore. Luke had passed the stage of skittishness, and sunken into resignation and frozen panic. Vader could ease it, he knew.

Remembering his mother's warmth, the soft echo of an untrained Force sensitive suddenly harshly comparable to Luke's wavering presence, Vader cradled his son's soul to his own.

Even after training with Obi-Wan, and whoever else had taught him to use his lightsaber, Luke was still little more than an infant in the Force. Powerful, but untrained, without the tools the Jedi had taught Vader, the means of protection and calming.

It had been a very long time since he'd tried to _use_ any of them…

But touching his son's frightened, frozen mind, he found it easy to slip back into them, guiding his son's stumbling presence along with himself, convincing the boy to breathe properly.

Anything to be with him.

Anything to have a son who could function, and reach back to him or _Force_ , even throw him away! He would have taken another refusal over the silent hurt that radiated from Luke, the way he buried his face in his father's chest, and lay still in submission.

It was a strange reminder that he would have to be a father. He had liked the idea back on Coruscant, when it had been tied with a happy life with Padmé, and he had liked it on Bespin, when it had meant additional power, and perhaps some reappearance of love in his life.

Now, it was a broken reality.

Much as the rest of his life, there was no joy to be found in it. The galaxy had taken his one fondest wish, to love and be loved, and twisted it once again. It mocked him, as it had mocked him with his inability to help his mother, as with his wife's betrayal, now with his son's resignation to the only father he would ever have.

In his arms, Luke gave a ragged sob, and Vader squeezed him tighter, ignoring the pain of his son's weight on his scars.

It felt more real than either of his other visions had. No matter how wonderful it would have been to raise a child in peace, or take in a man who was fully prepared to help defeat Palpatine-

Hadn't it always been like this that he'd seen family? Hadn't his mother held him in her arms, the only semblance of comfort in his life?

So his son's matted hair and shaking, pained body was only natural. This must have been the experience of being a parent after all. The others had been only dreams, an imagining of how life might have been for others, for _Padmé,_ had she only chosen someone more deserving.

But this was the only experience of parenting he'd have ever had. He'd been foolish to think otherwise.

In his arms, Luke choked on his breath again, and Vader looked down at him.

Luke. Luke, who looked so much like his father, with only cruel hints of his mother, in the shape of his nose and the determination in his eyes.

Luke was a Skywalker, after all. Not an Amidala, not a Nabierre, a _Skywalker_ , with all the pain and servitude the name implied.

For a second, Vader was angry with Padmé. Why had she ever thought having his child could be a good idea?! Hadn't it been clear to her that his family was destined only for pain? She should have aborted the moment she'd realized there was the threat of leaving another child to that cruelty-

But that wasn't fair.

He bent his head to his son's, opening the Force around them, their presences nearly combining at their closeness.

It was his own influence that had led the boy to this end. The pain had been passed in his own bloodline, and he should've known better than to be with Padmé in the first place. Her children should have been with someone of her own value, so she could have lived and been happy.

Luke, with his blonde hair and blue eyes and Force sensitivity and anger? Luke was Vader's child, through and through. Pain was his fate, much as it had been his father's.

But as his mother had done her best to protect him, Vader would do what he could for his son.

Luke still lay in near silence at his chest, crying in the tide of pain that washed around him, and Vader cradled the child's presence close, bringing over a medkit with a wave of a hand, and cautiously rolling Luke away from him to look over his injuries.

At least it was nothing a medspray couldn't ease.

"Shh," he murmured.

Luke didn't resist, allowing himself to be drawn out of his protective positioning. There was no flicker of relief, of comfort, of trust, but Vader told himself that would come later. For now, his son had come back to him, an infant in the Force, untrained and frightened, and hurt in his physical form. And Vader was tired of failing him.

He was tired of trying to give him more than a Skywalker could, and failing every time. Perhaps it was finally time to accept the truth, that Luke would never be more than a slave.

"Perhaps if your mother were still here," he sighed, pushing back Luke's sleeves, and spraying the medspray over a series of lacerations, trying not to think that some were too old to be results of torture, and seemed self-inflicted.

"My son."

Luke watched blankly as his father's metal hand fell to the scars on his wrists. He seemed unfazed by his father's revelation, impassive as his father's fingers explored the scars that were not quickly melting away.

"Did you attempt to take your own life?" Vader asked. His voice was damaged enough that it was not usually clear anyway, its roughness hiding the pain.

"Not very hard," Luke murmured, finally drawing his arms away.

Vader watched as he did his best to fold what remained of his arms. He moved as if he'd become used to lacking his hand, and Vader could remember all too clearly the pain in his face when _he_ had injured his son in a way, and to a degree, that no one else ever had.

"I was afraid," Luke rationalized, his gaze falling to his stump, and his fingers tightening around it. "You were going to make me something I don't want to be."

Vader ached at the pain in his son's face. The boy sat there, barely off his father's lap and out of his arms, clutching his old injury, and trying to deny what he was…

But there was no alternative.

"I am sorry, Luke."

Luke looked at him with confusion and pain written in every line of his face.

He truly had no idea. No idea that he was nothing, that the galaxy would never allow him happiness, that the most he could do was stay with his parent and never let the Skywalkers be divided and conquered again.

"For what?" Luke asked, and Vader expected a tirade, a reminder of his many crimes against his boy and the galaxy at large.

But it didn't come. Luke just looked at him, waiting for an answer, waiting for the words he didn't want to give.

"You deserved a better fate," Vader sighed, reaching over and caressing Luke's hair behind his ear for him, his fingers lingering on his son's face.

Had Luke only been born to another family, had his sweet eyes and soft hair only been the result of someone _else's_ genetics, he could have lived a happier life. But the boy was his son. And tied with the fact that Vader would love him no matter what occurred was the fact that the galaxy would hate him just as much.

"You were born to be a slave," he said, the words coming out soft and gentle, as resigned as the boy was. "And I wish that you had not been."

"I wasn't, though," Luke said, and for a heartbeat, some of his defiance returned, like a light flickering on behind his eyes. "I was born free, just like you wanted."

Vader gave him a sad smile. "Perhaps in the sense of trackers and detonators. But the Force has plans for our family, and they're not so easily escaped."

"I'm _free_ ," the boy insisted, and for the first time, he reached back to his father, squeezing his hand, his right arm reaching uselessly towards him as well. "We both could be!"

"You think I can walk away from this?" Vader asked, gesturing at himself, "Child, even if I could try to leave this behind, the Force would bring me back."

"You're not a slave anymore!"

"Aren't I?" he lifted his son more comfortably onto the bed, wrapping him in his blankets once more. He wouldn't send Luke back to prison, at least. They would serve their life sentences together, where he could be close, and comfort the boy as his mother had comforted him.

Yes, he thought, swaddling his son's Force presence, nudging and toying with it just enough for Luke to learn to respond. It was time to be a father.


End file.
